News Qi Hardware launches NanoNote

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2010/03/16/qi-hardware-launches-nanonote/1

 

I can think of one amazing ap for it. A tool which enables it to have wireless networking so it can become a portable browser/ media player . I should patent that idea oh wait already done. Hmmmm nope out of ideas for a low powered un internet accessible device.

All bad things aside it is a cool step in a nice direction. I would love the thing if it had internet capabilities. Its small and cheap which is perfect for quick email access. Its like a really dumbed down netbook which for the price would be quite nice.

 

It would make a pretty cruddy RSS aggregator / Wikipedia reader with no network connectivity! Why would you build something like this without wireless?

 

Any USB ports? That'd let Wifi go on it.

 

I lol'd, I'll wait for OpenPandora thanks

 

if they just added wireless n it would be perfect

 

http://en.qi-hardware.com/wiki/Mu_NanoNote_Specs - has USB, according to this. Wifi sticks, anyone?

 

What's with the Chinese characters?

 

i was thinking that but they are a bit bulky

now ive thought of soemthing why not internalise it

people have managed to internalise a lot more stuff in psp so it should be able to be done

 

The only thing I like about this thing is the price point. That being said even £66 is too much if the device is of no use to me. Wifi is the bare minimum this should have.

 

How about a GPS for navigation or location tracking

 

Actually theres quite a lot you can do with it even tough its offline only, for starters it will make a great little open source portable console, with those specs it should run doom 1/2, duke nukem 3d , and a lot of other open source games just fine, not to mention emulators like nes, mame scummvm that might not be full speed but will run quite a lot.


PS does any one know what inputs it has, does it support usb as host mode(that could fix "internet-lessness")

Edit: Just noticed it only has a 8­bit RGB LCD that makes it pretty useless for GFX or picture viewing

 

Indeed it does already run Doom & Quake. It does also have a MicroUSB host port, so in theory you could connect a USB wifi dongle - wouldn't look very good though, as you'd need adaptors/cables to go from full USB to MicroUSB... Plus, you'd have to port and probably heavily customise the drivers; that's not impossible, and exactly what the device was intended for - hacking (note the correct use of the term!!). Although it does have a MiniSDIO port and the manufacturer advises that it is compatible out of the box with several MiniSDIO WiFi chips already on the market. Although these cards are around £60-£80, from what I can see; which makes it very cost in-effective.

Reading the comments in the Engagdet link, I found a smaller Linux hacker toy already available that has WiFi built in and is cheaper: the Zipit Z2 wireless messenger (http://www.google.co.uk/search?rlz=1C1GGLS_en-GBGB368GB371&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=Zipit+Z2). It was designed to be a wifi-based IM device for "teens", but it can be hacked to run Linux quite easily. In fact it already runs Linux, but it's locked down so it's just a matter of replacing the kernel & software. Plus it's only $50. Although the only company I could find that will ship to Britain want to charge an extra $30 for shipping - can't really justify that. eBay was even more expensive.